Section: Scientific Foundations

Meristem functioning and development

In this second scientific axis, we develop models of meristem growth at tissue level in order to integrate various sources of knowledge and to analyse their dynamic and complex spatial interaction. To carry out this integration, we need to develop a complete methodological approach containing:

• image processing on stacks of images coming from confocal microscopy,

• algorithms to reconstruct the meristem surface or volume (partially based on classical image processing techniques),

• lineage algorithms that automatically track cell division throughout time,

• tools for structural and statistical analysis of 3D meristem structure (spatial statistics, multiscale geometric and topological analysis),

• physical models of cell interaction based on spring-mass systems or on tensorial mechanics at the level of cells,

• models of fluxes and physiological interactions between cells based on differential equations and partial differential equations,

• and models of cell development taking into account cell division and gene control (using either differential equations, finite state automata or Petri nets).